Control, Anton Corbijn's monochrome sweep through the short, sad and much-mythologised life of Ian Curtis, won five awards at the British Independent Film Awards last night, including best film, best director and best debut director.

The cast of the Dutch photographer's first feature film, which chronicles the Joy Division singer's marriage, epilepsy and suicide at the age of 23, were also rewarded. Sam Riley took the most promising newcomer award for his intense portrayal of Curtis, while Toby Kebbell won the best supporting actor prize for his turn as the band's sharp-tongued manager, Rob Gretton.

Riley - who played another prince of the Manchester music scene, Mark E Smith of the Fall, in Michael Winterbottom's 24 Hour Party People - had already earned considerable praise at Cannes for his performance, which captures both Curtis the guilt-ridden husband and Curtis the manic, wide-eyed stage marionette.

The film was a natural choice for Corbijn's debut. Having photographed Joy Division numerous times after moving to London in 1979 and directing the video for their song Atmosphere in 1988, he was closer than most to the band's story. Using Touching from a Distance, the book written by Curtis's widow, Deborah, as a starting point, he decided to bring Curtis's life to the screen and concentrate on the man rather than the poète maudit of popular culture.

A film about another towering figure of British popular music - Julien Temple's Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten - took the best documentary award.

Although Control carried off most of the prizes, which are intended to celebrate the best emerging and existent talents in independent British cinema, a few well-known names also picked up gongs. Dame Judi Dench won the best actress award for her role as Barbara, Cate Blanchett's machiavellian confidante in Notes on a Scandal, and Viggo Mortensen took best actor for his portrayal of a mysterious and heavily tattooed Russian gangster in David Cronenberg's London-set thriller, Eastern Promises.

The organisers of last night's awards ceremony at the Roundhouse in London said the international make-up of the prizewinners was a testament to the UK's cosmopolitan cinema industry. "A decade ago, the need for an awards ceremony that celebrated British independent film talent was identified," said its co-directors, Johanna von Fischer and Tessa Collinson. "We are now 10 years on and Bifa has grown to celebrate the increasingly diverse range of talent out there. This year's winners are no exception to this rule."

Patrick Marber, who adapted Zoe Heller's novel for the cinema, won best screenplay for Notes on a Scandal.

The prize for the best foreign independent feature went to The Lives of Others, a claustrophobic study of love, art and politics beneath the constant gaze of the Stasi in 1980s Berlin. Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck's film, described by the Guardian's film critic, Peter Bradshaw, as "intensively crafted liberal tragedy", won the Oscar for best foreign language film this year.

Two very different hard men of British film were also honoured. Ray Winstone, who won the best actor gong at the first Bifa event in 1998, was given the Richard Harris award for outstanding contribution by an actor. The 50-year-old Londoner, best known for his roles in Alan Clarke's borstal drama, Scum, and Jonathan Glazer's Sexy Beast, will also appear in the final Indiana Jones film, due out next year.

A rather more gentlemanly thug, Daniel Craig, took the Variety award for bringing the British film industry to international attention. John Woodward, chief executive officer of the UK Film Council, the major funding partner of the Bifas said: "This year's nominations and award winners really highlight the outstanding talent working in the UK with beautiful and thought-provoking films made by both established and emerging film-makers."